


Improbable and Commonplace

by orphan_account



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock (TV) RPF
Genre: Angst, First Time, Fluff, M/M, RPF, Romance
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2011-07-27
Updated: 2011-08-20
Packaged: 2017-10-21 19:47:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,243
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/229069
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>For the <a href="http://sherlockrpf.livejournal.com/3173.html?thread=117605#t117605">prompt</a>:</p><p>I'd like to see fic that deals with the issues that would come if Benny and Martin got together. Do they try to keep it on the down low at first, even to Moffiss & co? What are Moffiss' initial reactions? How are they "outed" to the general public and what happens then? How do you keep saying there's no homoeroticism between Holmes and Watson when the leads are regularly being, you know, homoerotic as soon as the cameras are off?</p><p>Basically, love doesn't happen in a vacuum. I want Benedict and Martin together in the real world.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I'm not entirely sure I believe I'm doing this. I was planning to post anon at sherlockrpf, but as far as I can tell, the meme is pretty dead, and comments are screened, so here I am. I'll do my best, but I'm warning you that I might die of shame before I finish this. Also, this is AU in the sense that Martin and Amanda are not and have never been together/had children, because, well, I simply couldn't write them splitting up, or have Martin cheating on her. Concrit is very welcome, especially regarding the character voices.
> 
> Finally, obviously, this is RPS, so if that offends you, please don't read it.

_Have you ever been in love? Horrible isn't it? It makes you so vulnerable. It opens your chest and it opens up your heart and it means that someone can get inside you and mess you up. You build up all these defenses, you build up a whole suit of armor, so that nothing can hurt you, then one stupid person, no different from any other stupid person, wanders into your stupid life...You give them a piece of you. They didn't ask for it. They did something dumb one day, like kiss you or smile at you, and then your life isn't your own anymore. Love takes hostages. It gets inside you._

Neil Gaiman

 

*

 

His leg has been jiggling for ten minutes.

He can't help it, it's a nervous habit. And Benedict can't remember _ever_ being this nervous, not even when he'd gotten a call from his agent saying Steven wanted him to come in and read for Sherlock. Acting came naturally to him, and any nervousness or stage fright he'd always been able to push down, to lock away in a tiny corner of his mind, and just be whatever the role demanded of him.

This is the part he isn’t good at, the part he doesn’t like. Feeling like he has to be accountable to someone else for his personal life, knowing that people, so many people, are weirdly invested in things to do with him that were frankly none of there business.

A warm hand settles on his leg, just above the knee.

"Ben, you need to relax. Mark's a good guy, he's not going to fucking freak out or anything."

Benedict immediately feels calmer; Martin's voice is low and soothing, his hand steady. He settles his own hand over Martin's, and watches the other man lace their fingers together. He breathes deeply and allows his body to relax. He sneaks a look over at Martin, who's fiddling one-handedly with his phone. Benedict can't help but snort with laughter.

"Oi," Martin says, elbowing Benedict in the ribs, but smiling nonetheless.

"It's not my fault you're a complete philistine when it comes to technology," he replies, leaning into Martin's body a little more.

"It's not my fault the buttons are so bloody small," Martin grumbles, squinting at the phone as he continues to text slowly.

They sit in silence for a few minutes, comfortable and easy in each other's presence. Martin eventually finishes his text and reaches for his drink, glancing around the room. They're in a quiet pub, sitting in a booth in the corner that had them reasonably well-hidden. Martin swears (quite literally) by this pub, vows he's never once been approached, or even looked at, in here. Even so, Benedict is uneasy again. More than just the medium level of unease he feels when he's approached by strangers, which he's getting much better at dealing with, but an almost stomach-clenching worry that he can't get rid of.

His leg starts jiggling again.

Martin sighs and turns his hand over, gripping Benedict's hand properly.

"Look at me," he says seriously. Benedict raises his eyes from the table to meet Martin's dark blue ones. "It's going to be fine."

"You can't possibly know that," Benedict blurts out. Because he _can't_ , there's no way Martin can possible guarantee him that. There's no way of knowing this isn't all going to go to hell tomorrow morning, that he isn't going to wake up to a tabloid headline and a furious phone call from his agent.

Martin smiles and shrugs.

"Call me an optimist, but I can, and I do."

Benedict gives him a small smile in reply, even if the knot in his stomach has only eased very slightly. He's lost Martin's attention though, Martin's gaze now fixed over his shoulder.

"Mark's here," he says, raising his free hand to beckon Mark over.

Mark sits down opposite them, a wide smile on his face.

"Evening, chaps," he says, unwinding his scarf from around his neck and dumping it next to him.

They make friendly but desultory conversation for a few minutes, which Benedict finds it extremely hard to pay attention to, before there's a lull in the conversation and Martin clears his throat.

"Look, Mark, the reason I asked you to meet us was that, well, we have something to tell you," he begins, and Benedict can't help but marvel at the complete steadiness of his voice, the utter lack of fear. He watches Mark as Martin says this, the way Mark's brow furrows and his eyes flick between the two of them. He sees Mark noticing how close together they're sitting, the position of their arms, the way Benedict's body is (always, instinctively) turned towards Martin's. He can see the minute it clicks in Mark's mind and the comprehension that dawns in his eyes.

"Yes," he says to Mark, and he's amazed that his own voice comes out smooth and steady. Martin squeezes his hand. "It's what you're thinking."

Mark looks stunned. Benedict doesn't blame him, and he knows (more than anyone) that the situation is a serious one, but seeing the expression on Mark's usually composed, smiling face _is_ a little amusing. Clearly Martin thinks so too, because he's doing that weird thing with his lips he does when he's trying not to laugh. It's so ridiculously endearing, it's always been so ridiculously endearing, that Benedict wonders for a moment if it would be totally out of line for him to lean over just a little and kiss him. But, no, not a good idea, wouldn't want to give poor Mark a heart attack.

"Much as I hate to be deliberately obtuse," Mark begins hesitantly, "I think this is probably a conversation in which there should be no...equivocation. What are you telling me, exactly?"

Martin rolls his eyes and starts to speak, but clearly a better idea catches hold of him, because his mouth snaps shut. Benedict spies the beginnings of a wicked grin on Martin's face, and he has only a second's warning from Martin's eyes before Martin's hand is on his neck, pulling him down and kissing him. It's a brief, close-mouthed kiss, but there is absolutely no ambiguity to it.

Benedict isn't sure whether to laugh or hit him for being so bloody reckless.

Mark gapes at them.

"D'you need a drink?" Martin asks after a moment, when it becomes clear that Mark doesn't have any idea what to say. Mark shakes his head briefly, as if to clear it, and gives him a wry smile.

"I think I might."


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the delay. I got overwhelmed by real life stuff, and got to 10k words before realising it more or less all had to be rewritten. So I'm still feeling my way a little, hopefully everything will pan out!

Martin slips out of the booth and over to the bar, and Benedict’s eyes track him automatically. He watches him order and lean against the bar, fingers drumming on the counter top, head bopping slightly to some beat playing in his head/. He doesn’t even notice he’s watching until Mark nudges him, and Benedict turns his eyes on him.

“Is it serious?”

Mark’s expression is curious; a mixture of surprise and affection and just a hint of wariness. Benedict sighs.

“Of course it is. We wouldn’t be telling you if it wasn’t.”

Mark snorts and nods.

“I guessed as much.”

They both watch Martin for a moment, before Benedict turns back to Mark.

“So what do you think? Sorry to spring it on you, but...” He shrugs. “There wasn’t really another way to do it.” Mark seems to understand.

“Well, obviously, I’m surprised. I didn’t know that you were--”

“Gay?” Benedict interjects, raising his eyebrows.

Mark smiles at his bluntness.

“Well, yes,” he says.

Benedict can’t help but smile too, a little wryly.

“Not sure that I am, to be honest. I’ve never been in a relationship with a man before. Never really wanted to be. This is all rather new to me. Rather terrifying at first, actually.”

Mark nods understandingly, and looks thoughtful.

“I’m surprised, obviously,” he says slowly, “but not unpleasantly so. It’s going to be a little complicated, but, well, the two of you, it makes a strange kind of sense. You have great chemistry on-screen. And you were always terrific friends, right from the beginning.”

Martin returns to the table with the fresh drinks before Benedict can answer, and slides back into his seat.

“Cheers,” Mark says, tipping his drink to the two of them.

“Alright, let the cross examination begin,” Martin says, his voice tinged with amusement.

Mark holds his hands up defensively, an innocent expression on his face.

“No interrogation, I promise. I am curious, but it’s entirely up to you what you want to tell me.”

“What do you want to know?”

Mark takes another thoughtful sip of his drink.

“How long?”

There’s a moment of silence, then--

“Four months,” says Benedict.

“Two months,” Martin says, at exactly the same time.

They look at each other in surprise and Mark laughs.

“Which is it, then? Trust the two of you to have different answers,” he teases.

Martin is looking at him steadily, his dark blue eyes curious.

“You’re counting from March? But that wasn’t...”

Except that it _was_. Martin may date the start of their relationship from the moment they decided that yes, this was something they were going to do and fuck the consequences, but Benedict has always counted it as beginning with their first kiss. Occasionally, when he’s too tired or a little too drunk to have all the proper mental defenses in place, he counts it from the _very_ beginning, nearly two and a half years ago.

Martin still looks surprised, and Benedict can’t resist the opportunity to have a little jibe at him.

“I’m quite hurt, you know,” he says as solemnly as he can manage. “Clearly I was under a misapprehension regarding our relationship for quite some time.” He smirks at him. “You know, you never did tell me what you got up to in New Zealand...”

“Oh, I don’t think your delicate ears could take it,” Martin says, grinning roguishly, before his familiar features smooth back into seriousness. “March, then?” He sounds pleased by the idea, like it’s an indulgence he’d not expected to receive.

Benedict nods, dropping his hand to Martin’s leg and squeezing his knee. He turns back to Mark, who’s been watching them with a half-bemused, half-exasperated expression on his face.

“Just over four months,” he says firmly.

“Glad the two of you have sorted that out,” Mark retorts. “I have to say, I’m impressed you managed to keep it quiet. Do I want to know what the two of you have been getting up to around the set?”

Martin, who’d been taking a dip of his drink, splutters a little, and Benedict thumps him on the back, trying to bite back a smile. Mark probably really _doesn’t_ want to know, especially what happened two weeks ago at the studio in Cardiff.. Mark looks faintly horrified, but also a tiny bit amused.

“Alright then,” he says, shaking his head. “Much as I’m dying to know exactly how this all happened, I’m sure that’s not why you asked me here.”

Martin nods.

“Yeah. We wanted to tell you first. Well, almost first. My PA knows, and so does Ben’s. It was more or less inevitable. And, er, my brother too, and please don’t ask me how.”

Benedict winces at the memory, and Mark grins.

“Oh, I will definitely be asking _that_ question at some point.”

Bendict groans and lowers his head to the table.

“It was the single most embarrassing moment of my life,” he says, trying to suppress the memory. “And there have been plenty of those.”

Martin pokes him in the ribs, and then slides his arm around his waist.

“Stop being a such a fucking drama queen, it could have been worse.”

“How, exactly?” Benedict demands.

“Well we could have been mid--”

“Yes, alright lads, I get the picture,” Mark interrupts, looking pained. “Details are unnecessary.”

Benedict nods fervently in agreement, and Martin squeezes his waist in a way that _still_ makes his heart turn over. They all pause and drink for a moment, and the atmosphere shifts back to serious.

“So what’s the verdict?” Martin asks eventually.

“It’s not that I’m not...happy for the two of you,” he says slowly. “But this is complicated.”

Martin scowls.

“You think we don’t fucking know that? That’s why we’re talking to you.”

Mark looks slightly hurt, and Benedict squeezes Martin’s leg. Martin glares at him mutinously, but wraps his fingers around Benedict’s nevertheless.

“As your friend, I’m thrilled for the two of you. I think you’ll be great together,” Mark says, shrugging his shoulders. It feels like there must be a “but” coming, but Mark surprises him.

“What were the two of you thinking? Do you want this to be a public thing? Do you want to actually, for lack of a better word, come out?”

Benedict sighs and stares into his drink. They’ve talked about this, he and Martin. Argued, more like. Back and forth until he thought he might throw things. It’s a useless fantasy, but he wishes, so fervently, that it just didn’t fucking matter. That he could equally well walk down the street or the red carpet holding Martin’s hand, and absolutely no one would care. He sneaks a sideways glance and sees Martin staring equally glumly into his own glass.

“We don’t know,” he says eventually, raising his eyes to Mark, who’s been watching the pair of them with a furrowed brow. Mark looks unsurprised at this.

“You don’t have to decide now,” he says gently. “But--”

“Soon,” Martin finishes his sentence. Mark nods.

“Or soonish. I don’t imagine the two of you _like_ sneaking around and not being able to do whatever the hell you want to. And, obviously, it’d be better if you were able to come out yourselves, rather than be papped on set, or at a bar, or anywhere. And the sooner you do it, the less likely the latter is to happen.”

Benedict can’t help but notice how horribly _nice_ Mark is being about the whole thing. He hasn’t mentioned the show once, except obliquely, as if this thing between him and Martin were entirely removed from it, as if the one wasn’t inexorably tied to the other. He’s grateful for it, immensely grateful, but he still has to ask, to throw out there what they’ve all been thinking but no one has said yet.

“And what about the show?”

Mark sighs.

“That’s what I don’t know about. I have to think, you understand? And it’s up to you, entirely, but I do really think you should tell--”

“Steven and Sue? Yes, we thought so, too,” Benedict interjects. “We came to you first because it seemed easier to tell one person first rather than two or three.”

Mark looks relieved that he hasn’t had to convince them.

“Okay,” he says, nodding. “Okay. Had you had any thoughts about when?”

“Soon,” Martin says. “Sometime next week. We had originally though when filming wraps, but...”

He trails off with a shrug.

“It’s getting old. I’m fucking tired of it, to be honest, trying to hide it from everyone. So we decided the sooner the better.”

Benedict snorts. More like Martin had decided the sooner the better. Benedict would have been quite happy for the entire rest of the world to fuck _right_ off, but Martin had eventually talked him round. In fairness, he’d been quite happy to tell Mark-his-friend about it, looking forward to it even. Mark-the-producer he’d been less excited about sharing with.

“Fine, then,” Mark says. “We’ll have a meeting next week about it, how does that sound? Thursday would probably work best, it’s the only day that...”

Mark talks on, and Benedict can only marvel at the fact that his love life is the sort of thing people have meetings about. He wonders when that happened. Well, presumably when he’d thought _fuck it all_ and kissed his co-star like it was going out of style, and been kissed back with equal enthusiasm.

They stay a while longer, the talk moving to less complicated subjects as the night grows older. Despite how little Benedict had been looking forward to it, the knot of anxiety in his stomach has eased a little and he’s feeling more relaxed than he’d thought possible. Maybe this won't be so bad after all.

*

They catch a taxi back to his flat; Benedict hates driving in central London, and Martin doesn’t drive at all. They spend at least five nights out of seven together, when they’re not filming. Which isn’t saying much, given that they’ve been filming for nearly the entire time they’ve been together.

“Alright?” Martin asks him quietly, reaching across the space between them to grasp his hand. It still surprises him, how _handsy_ Martin can be. He likes to touch; hand-holding, knuckles brushed along arms, fingers tracing patterns on knees. Benedict likes it; h e hadn’t been aware of how much Martin had been refraining from touching him, before, and now he doesn’t think he could do with out it.

He nods and smiles, squeezing back a little.

“Perfectly alright. I wish we didn’t have to--”

“I know.”

“--but it wasn’t so bad.”

They sit in easy silence for a while. Benedict studies Martin’s profile as his...boyfriend? Partner? They’ve yet to sort out the labels...as he stares out the window. His neck is tense and jaw is slightly clenched, his eyes focused out of the window. Benedict nudges his knee with his own.

“Are _you_ okay?”

Martin doesn’t say anything right away, although his fingers tighten around Benedict's. Eventually, he sighs.

“I fucking hate this, you know.” He scowls out the window, and the streetlights throwing his features into sharp relief heighten the effect. He looks almost comically angry. Benedict slides across the back seat until they're pressed together, and kisses Martin's neck.

"I know. I believe I was just expressing the same sentiment," he says against Martin's skin.

"Yes, yes, alright," Martin grumbles, turning his head a little. Benedict kisses him again. "This is just not at all what I ever wanted."

Benedict draws back slightly. He knows, or thinks he knows, what Martin means, but the words still sting. Martin clearly realises how his words sounded, as he tips his head back against the headrest and groans.

"Sorry, sorry, that's not what I meant," he says, running his fingers through his hair. "I meant that I never wanted to have to fucking _hide_ anything about myself. I hate it. "

"I'm...sorry." He can't think how better to say it.

"What the fuck are you sorry for?" Martin demands, turning to look him squarely in the face. "Don't you fucking dare."

"What?" Benedict replies defensively. "I'm just saying that I'm sorry that you have to do something you hate in order to--"

He's silenced by Martin's lips on his, set in a hard line. It's still thrills him, still makes his pulse race a little, that they're actually doing this now, that he can have this, any time he wants it.

"The thing is," Martin says, pulling away, " _I'm_ not sorry at all. So shut up."

Benedict huffs a laugh and draws back further, suddenly aware they're in the back of a cab and this isn't the best idea and that if he doesn't put some space between them, he's going to do something stupid.

The rest of the trip passes in silence. Their fingers remain twined together.


End file.
